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Another week, another cock-up on Zimbabwe. It's not funny anymore
Comment, Financial Mail (SA)
June 02, 2006

http://www.zwnews.com/issuefull.cfm?ArticleID=14548

Another week, another cock-up on Zimbabwe. It's not funny anymore. We've become a laughing stock. But more important, people are dying in Zimbabwe and we don't care. I wonder what would have happened to the so-called Rainbow Nation had the rest of the world washed its hands and urged us to get on with it. President Thabo Mbeki made a much-publicised trip last week presumably to talk about Africa over tea with Tony Blair. It's a year since the G8 met in Gleneagles. What to do with Africa was a big story. Western masses, egged on by their celebrities, marched in the streets and demanded action from their leaders. They were dotting the i's and crossing the t's when everything went up in smoke. Bombs in London ripped everything apart. And so Africa went back to where it belongs - at the back of the queue. The G8 is meeting again in the next few weeks in St Petersburg, Russia. Vladimir Putin has never been a friend of the developing world. The Soviet Union was. Putin has bigger fish to fry. And, as host, he's in charge of the agenda. In the past he's expressed some irritation with the G8's preoccupation with Africa.

So Mbeki went to London presumably to assess progress made with Blair's manful attempt to put Africa at the top of the international agenda. It is not unreasonable to imagine that "how to handle the host" was also on the agenda. But Mbeki knows that any discussion on Africa is incomplete without a mention of the terrible situation in Zimbabwe. He came prepared. Robert Mugabe, in an attempt to mollify the wrath of the international community after Operation Murambatsvina (Drive Out Trash), last year invited UN secretary-general Kofi Annan to Harare. In the past few weeks, Annan's office made it known that his busy schedule would allow him finally to make the trip. That little shield came in very handy for Mbeki in London, and he wielded it with some vigour. So whenever the Zimbabwe question was posed, there was a stock answer: Annan is going to Harare. Let's wait and see what happens. Suddenly a low-key visit took on the mantle of a mission that would in one fell swoop solve all Zimbabwe's problems. We're clutching at straws here. But all Mbeki wanted was to simply get out of a jam. Unfortunately Mugabe, as always, did not play ball. Mbeki had hardly finished talking up Annan's visit before Mugabe cancelled it. It's not the first time that Mbeki has been so publicly humiliated by Mugabe. How much of this can he continue to take?

Mbeki's lack of action on Zimbabwe is as illogical, incomprehensible and insensitive as his views on Aids. They are the issues which raise his hackles more than any other. Mistakes were made, conceded Winnie Madikizela-Mandela rather reluctantly after much prompting by Archbishop Desmond Tutu on the Stompie Seipei affair at the Truth & Reconciliation Commission. The non rapist has apologised, to no-one in particular, for attributing medicinal qualities to a shower. Even the odd couple - Tony Blair and George Bush - have publicly admitted what everybody knew all along - that monumental blunders were made in the invasion of Iraq. You admit to mistakes, learn from them and move on. As Mbeki approaches the sunset of his political career, he should be thinking about his legacy: how history will judge him. Unless he concedes that a mistake was made he won't be remembered as the man who presided over the most sustained economic growth in a long time; or the man who single-handedly put the developing world at the centre of the international agenda. History won't be kind to him. He will be known or remembered as the man who looked the other way as Zimbabwe burnt, or the man who rested on his laurels as his people were devastated by the Aids pandemic. There are stock answers for both - we have the best ARV programme in the world, and so on. It just doesn't wash, Mr President. It is those who feel it who are the final arbiter; the only ones whose views matter.

The SA government may have decided to sit on its hands because it believed Mugabe's wrath was reserved for the white farmers. In fact the majority of the victims of his brutality are black people, most of whom had nothing. They are now in even worse straits. That should call for a change of policy. Who are these poor that we're determined to help if the poor of Zimbabwe don't fit the bill? Or are we just reciting the mantra so that we can feel good about it? With his party turning against him, Mbeki needs success, good news that would turn the headlines in his favour. He needs to stay relevant. They are lining up to prematurely dance on his grave, and that includes the ungrateful Mugabe, the biggest beneficiary of his generosity. By changing tack on Zimbabwe, Mbeki will not be betraying his beloved Africa project; he will be remaining true to its spirit. You can't preach to others if you can't sweep your own backyard.

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